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Pacinthe Mattar: Objectivity, Press Freedom, and the Palestine Exception

  • Room 2228 Richcraft Building, Carleton University Ottawa (map)

Monday, September 30, 2024,  7:00 PM - 9:00 PM /  Room 2228 Richcraft Building, Carleton University

When Pacinthe Mattar was a producer at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, only one story of hers did not make it to air out of the thousands she produced daily over her ten-year tenure. It was about Palestine, and it changed the trajectory of her journalism career.

The so-called racial reckoning of 2020 forced the journalism industry to–however briefly–listen to its Black, Indigenous and racialized peers as they detailed their experiences with systemic racism in media institutions. Mattar wrote the National Magazine Award-winning article, “Objectivity Is A Privilege Afforded To White Journalists,” now a mainstay in syllabi at journalism schools across North America. But while the journalism industry has learned to name and begin to address anti-Black and anti-Indigenous and other forms of racism, it can barely even name anti-Palestinian racism. Meanwhile in Gaza and the West Bank, over 110 Palestinian journalists and media workers have been killed in the last year, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, making it the deadliest period for journalists in recorded history.

In this talk, journalist Pacinthe Mattar will open her reporter’s notebook and share her experiences covering and talking about Palestine – and explain why it’s one of the most urgent and critical press freedom issues of our time.

Learn more and register at: https://carleton.ca/sjc/cu-events/pacinthe-mattar-carleton/

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